We sat down for an exclusive interview with Elizabeth Huskisson, writer and performer of Where Have All Our Women Gone?
Where Have All Our Women Gone comes to Liverpool’s Unity Theatre for one night only, Friday 13th March – Tickets here.
International Women’s Day is often framed as a moment of celebration, but your work confronts what happens when women are missing, silenced, or erased. What does International Women’s Day mean to you personally, and how does Where Have All Our Women Gone? complicate that narrative?
International Women’s Day is of course a celebration and a day I always use to recognise the phenomenal women around me, particularly those who have been so integral in creating and championing this play. For me, IWD is also about reigniting the revolution inside myself and inside the work. I think celebration and rebellion can happen side by side, I think there can be a call to arms, a need for change and a moment to rejoice. It’s really important that we understand why IWD is fundamental and why a revolution is nothing short of vital. Every three day a man kills a woman in the UK. That statistic should haunt us, horrify us, and demand we make a change.
The play asks a stark, recurring question—where have all our women gone? On a day dedicated to women’s voices and achievements, what do you hope audiences are forced to reckon with after watching this work?
I always hope the women feel seen and are able to have a deeply cathartic experience, I hope they feel their rage is shared and valid. Often the women have something much darker to reckon with, the heartbreaking reality of being a woman and how violent that act of existence can be. That alone is enough for the women in the audience to reckon with. I hope the men reckon with their own complacency, complicity and capacity for change. I’m so keen for more men to engage with this work, because it’s not a lecture, it’s not an hour long criticism, it’s a piece of work that captures a feeling shared my thousands of women, it’s a reflection of a nation in a state of moral bankruptcy, in desperate need of change. I am always blown away by the responses from the men in the audience and it always reaffirms why I make this work. It’s deeply educational for them, emotionally educational and that’s crucial in engaging men in this conversation.
You describe the piece as both theatre and activism, using satire, sincerity, and the surreal to address male violence against women and girls. How do you balance emotional accessibility with political urgency—especially for audiences who may be encountering these realities for the first time?
I don’t know if this show is emotionally accessible, I don’t know if it should be, in so much as, the discomfort the audience experience, is an important aspect in provoking them into action. We have a lot of content warnings on this show, it can be triggering and it’s pretty relentless so I always try to provide an infrastructure for people to understand the world they’re about to walk into, but the play reflects reality so I refuse to sanitise it for people’s comfort. As you say, it’s urgent, so we attack this work with courage and conviction. And if you’re encountering these realities for the first time, then my honest thought would be, perhaps you need to reflect on the privilege you’re experiencing that means this doesn’t exist in your cultural sphere.
This production has been performed in extraordinary contexts, including within the police force. On International Women’s Day, what do you think institutions—not just individuals—still need to hear, acknowledge, or change?
In the words of the remarkable Giséle Pelicot, shame must change sides. We need to reshape the cultural conversation, the discourse in the media and institutional structures. I have seen in far too many companies and institutions where structures are not in place to ensure women’s safety or provide support. Including women in conversations to reimagine the infrastructures of our society is the only way to create a society that works for women. The threat we are facing is complex and vast, and statistically growing at an alarming rate. We need to believe the women, educate the men and demand the men educate themselves.
International Women’s Day often asks, what progress has been made? After performing this play repeatedly, do you feel hopeful, exhausted, or something more complicated—and where do you locate hope, if at all?
I have a lot of hope, rebellion is rooted in hope, we rebel because we believe change is possible. I have hope because of the remarkable women I have met whilst creating and performing this play. They are endlessly courageous. Their kindness gives me hope, their fierce belief in change gives me hope. And yet of course, it’s exhausting. And it’s terrifying. And I find it hard to believe, truly hard to believe that this is real.